Free Midwinter Nightingale by Joan Aiken Page A

never do, give your wretched mount a wicked shock. But the boots will be just the article for foot soldiers—get themacross country at the devil of a pace. Save issuing them with horses.”
    Jorinda's eyes sparkled with interest.
    “Which side are you on, Granda? The Burgundians? Or the United Saxons'?”
    “Hold your tongue, miss! Walls have ears. And it's none of your business.”
    “Granda, it's common knowledge in Bath that if the Burgundians get into power, they are going to ban foxhunting.”
    “What?”
    “Because hunting makes such a mess of the vineyards.”
    “Who says so?”
    “Everybody. So, which are you—?”
    “Hold your tongue, I said!” Sir Thomas, dangerously purple, opened one of his last two letters and stared at it in furious perplexity “What the flaming blazes is
this?
Knights Templar of Palestina? 'Chain of heroic love and good luck around the globe. All sanctified by His Reverence the Ninth in Succession to the Throne of the World Soul given on the fourth day of revelation at the New Olympus.' What the
deuce
is all this driveling balderdash, may I ask?”
    Jorinda jumped up from her chair and went to read over her grandfather's shoulder.
    “Oh, it is one of these chain letters, Granda. I know people at school who have had them. Yes, yes, you see, it says you must send it on within twenty-one days, and ifyou do that, some tremendous piece of good fortune will come your way.”
    “Send it on where? Send it to 'whom?” demanded Sir Thomas.
    “Oh, to anybody you choose. Send it to friends”—or to enemies, Jorinda was on the point of adding, but she caught Gribben's eye, gave him a wicked grin and slid her hand over her mouth.
    “And if I don't send it on, but drop it in the fire, as such a parcel of trumpery foolishness deserves?” snapped Sir Thomas.
    “Let's see, umm …” Jorinda studied the page of small, densely packed handwriting with a frown creasing her black brows and, after a moment, said, “Oh, well, some misfortune will happen to you then; it doesn't tell you what.”
    “So who in the world sent me this piece of rubbish?”
    “Goodness only knows, Granda. One of your friends, I daresay—somebody who wishes you well.” A glint in Jorinda's eye suggested that there was plenty of choice, but she made no suggestion. “I'll help you reply to it, Granda. It will be no trouble at all. Have you any paper? I'll do the twenty copies they say you have to send on. It will be good practice for me; Miss Gravestone kept saying that my handwriting was not sufficiently ladylike.”
    “Twenty copies? I'm supposed to make twenty copies of this total rubbish?”
    In his outrage at such a suggestion, Sir Thomas nearly drank off the boiling balloon glass of brandy. It wasdeftly fielded by Gribben, who slid it out of reach and substituted the coffee cup.
    “Now, now, sir! Best you take it easy for a minute on the settle, until hounds have met. I'll call you in good time before they draw off; don't you fret your head.”
    But Sir Thomas was reading his last letter, and its contents caused him to explode into a seething incandescence of rage that made his previous vexation seem no more than a mild murmur.
    “What's this, what is this? That pestilent boy—can I never have a day's peace from news about his horrible doings?”
    “Oh, dear, Granda, is it about Lot? I'm very sorry if he has done something to upset you. What is it now?”
    “That brother of yours—oh, very well, half brother— it's not sufficient that he's been expelled from that school of his, Fogrum Hall, for outrageous behavior and burning the headmaster's book—”
    “Burning his book—oh, yes, he did say something—” Jorinda began, then clapped her hand over her mouth.
    “Some book the fella, Pentecost, wrote, was writing— ask
me
, headmasters ought to be teaching, not writing books; however, that's neither here nor there—your half brother took and burned it. Not only that, but now, it seems, he's been and